Socioeconomic and Environmental Impacts of Biofuels Evidence from Developing Nations

About this book

Biofuels are currently in the middle of a heated academic and public policy debate. Biofuel production has increased fivefold in the past decade and is expected to further double by 2020. Most of this expansion will happen in developing nations. This volume is the first of its kind, providing a comprehensive overview of the biofuel debate in developing countries. The chapters are written by a multidisciplinary team of experts, exposing the key drivers and impacts of biofuel production and use. Socioeconomic and Environmental Impacts of Biofuels covers impacts as diverse as air pollution, biodiversity loss, deforestation, energy security, food security, greenhouse gas emissions, land use change, rural development, water consumption and other socioeconomic issues. Its wide focus accommodates examples from countries in Africa, America and Asia. As such, this book will become an indispensable companion to academics, practitioners and policy makers who wish to know more about biofuel issues in the developing world.

Contents

Foreword Stephen Polasky

Part I. Global Overview
1. Biofuels at the confluence of energy security, rural development and food security: a developing country perspective
2. The interrelations of future global bioenergy potentials, food demand and agricultural technology
3. Air pollution impacts of biofuels
4. Water for bioenergy: a global analysis
5. The challenges of estimating tropical deforestation due to biofuel expansion

Part II. The Case of Brazil
6. The Brazilian bioethanol and biodiesel programs: drivers, policies and impacts
7. Power, social impacts, and certification of ethanol fuel: view from the northeast of Brazil
8. Implications of global ethanol expansion on Brazilian regional land use

Part III. Asia
9. Biofuel expansion in southeast Asia: biodiversity impacts and policy guidelines
10. Jatropha production for biodiesel in Yunnan, China: implications for sustainability at the village level

Part IV. Africa
11. Biofuels and Africa: impacts and linkages at the household-level
12. Energy security, agro-industrial development and international trade: the case of sugarcane in southern Africa
13. Environmental and socio-economic considerations for jatropha growing in Southern Africa

Part V. Synthesis
14. Biofuels in developing countries: a synthesis

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Biography

Alexandros Gasparatos is a James Martin Research Fellow at the Biodiversity Institute, Oxford University. He has published on a wide range of topics including biofuels, food security, energy security, ecosystem services, urban biodiversity and sustainability assessment. He has been involved in several major research projects during his time at Oxford University, the United Nations University (Yokohama, Japan) and the University of Dundee. Dr Gasparatos is committed to policy-relevant research and contributed to policy reports that were launched during the 10th Conference of the Parties of the Convention for Biological Diversity. He has a background in ecological economics (PhD, University of Dundee), environmental science (MSc, Imperial College, London) and chemistry (BSc, University of Patra).

Per Stromberg is a Visiting Research Fellow at the United Nations University (Yokohama, Japan) and is an environmental economist at the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency. He is a Cambridge European Trust Fellow and holds a PhD and MSc in environmental economics (University of Cambridge and University College, London, respectively) and a BSc in economics (Stockholm University). He was awarded the James Claydon Prize in Economics from the University of Cambridge. Having lectured at universities in Japan and Peru, he was also responsible for the MSc module on environmental economics at the United Nations University. Currently his research focuses on the economics of climate change, ecosystem services and biofuel production and he has published widely on economic development and the environment. He has been a researcher for the UN Development Programme, the UN Economic Commission for Latin America, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the economics unit of the Delegation of the European Commission in Mexico and the International Institute for Environment and Development and previously headed the Sustainable Development Governance unit at the United Nations University's Institute of Advanced Studies.